


Come back down from this cloud

by Builder



Series: Heroverse [3]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Headaches & Migraines, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Minor Character Death, Mission Fic, More Hurt Than Comfort, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Sickfic, Vomiting, descriptions of injuries, relatively vague descriptions of dead bodies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-13
Updated: 2017-10-13
Packaged: 2019-01-16 17:31:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,212
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12347304
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Builder/pseuds/Builder
Summary: The girl slowly lifts her head and shifts her gaze to Bucky.  Her eyes are a deep green and somewhat wild looking, and her lips are parted and trembling.“This is James.  He’s here to help you,” Steve says.  “You’re free now.”  He extends a hand hesitantly toward her.She doesn’t respond.  The girl blinks and resumes her gaze on Bucky’s face.  “Soldier,” she breathes.There’s a beat of silence.  “Yeah,” Bucky murmurs back._________________________________________________Bucky's joining the Avengers for his first mission, but his past is still haunting him.  Steve does his best to make everything ok, but he's not doing so well himself.





	Come back down from this cloud

**Author's Note:**

> This started out as a prompt from Tumblr, and it turned into an epic. Visit me on Tumblr @Builder051. 
> 
> Title courtesy of Bush.
> 
> Warnings are in the tags. I think I got everything.
> 
> This fic is kind of a downer, just so you know. But I'm really pleased with how it turned out.

The flight from Avengers tower in New York City to the landing zone Allegany is short, but the jet’s path curves over a generous spread of rural-looking Pennsylvania before popping back into the semi-urban neighborhoods of western New York State.  Steve’s head is beginning to ache with the altitude pressure.  He bounces his knee restlessly and examines the terrain visible through the window.  From the jet’s height, everything looks like a blown up topographic map.  Vast stretches of green-brown grass are cut with miniature fine-line roads and interrupted with blackish cutouts of water. 

 

Steve feels nostalgic looking at it, but also foreign.  Growing up in Brooklyn gave him a daily view of cars and buildings and smokestacks; he’d never seen farmland in person until his tours across North America and Europe as Captain America the bond salesman.  It makes him feel odd, like he’s underqualified for his position.  Captain America should know more about, well, America.

 

“Yo,” Sam says, breaking Steve’s train of thought.

 

“Hm?” Steve asks, unsure if Sam’s starting a conversation, or if he’s already missed something.

 

“You ok, fearless leader?” Sam jokes.

 

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Steve answers, pretending he really is.  “Just thinking about…irony.”

 

“What, like that we’re still playing HYDRA whack-a-mole even though it technically fell with SHIELD?”

 

“No,” Steve says.  He considers explaining, but decides better of it.  “It’s, uh…doesn’t matter.”  He’s supposed to be focused on the mission, not being sad and nostalgic for things he’s never actually experienced.

 

“What’s whack-a-mole?” Bucky inquires from the other side of the jet where he’s sitting with Nat. 

 

“You’ve been back how long and no one’s taken you to an arcade?” Sam asks with incredulity.

 

“No,” Bucky says, clearly confused about the proper emotion to tie to his answer.

 

“I think we decided that’s not a great environment,” Steve offers.  “Too artificial.”

 

“Oh,” Sam says, backing off a little.  He launches into an explanation of the game, getting defensive when Bucky laughs and fails to understand why such a thing would be considered fun or competitive.

 

“Wouldn’t it be better to tear apart the machine?  That would keep them from coming back.”

 

“Dude…that’s not how it works.”  Sam shakes his head.

 

***

 

The jet lands on the top level of an abandoned parking garage beside a run-down brick building.  The craft idles and vibrates for a moment, then Clint and Tony climb out of the cockpit to suit up. 

 

Steve cranks open the door and steps to the waist-high barrier at the edge of the structure.  He peers across a narrow street to the rusty-colored building.  At this height, Steve’s level with the roof.  The whole thing’s pretty dilapidated.  There are broken windows.  Clusters of reddish brown spot the sidewalk where odd bricks have fallen and smashed on the ground below.  No one’s swept them up or put in for repairs.  Around the side of the building is a line of square white vehicles are parked in a driveway-type strip of asphalt.  They’re nondescript from the top, but Steve sees a hint of red and blue decorating the sides of the boxes.  Ambulances.

 

Bucky comes up beside him and rests his elbows on the concrete barrier as he pulls on his gloves. 

 

“It’s a hospital,” Steve says.

 

“Mm,” Bucky exhales.  He’s silent for a moment.  Then, “It’s weird.”  Steve knows he isn’t reacting just to the type of building.

 

“Yeah,” Steve agrees.  “Something about this feels, just, off.”

 

“Yeah,” Bucky repeats.  “There was nothing on the radar for so long, and then all the sudden…” he trails off.  “It’s like their stealth and encryption just died overnight.”

 

“You doing ok?” Steve asks him, patting Bucky’s shoulder.  “You excited or nervous or…”

 

“I’m ok,” Bucky replies. 

 

“It’s your first mission,” Steve says.  “It’s ok to feel a little weird about it.”

 

“I’m good,” Bucky reinforces.  He turns to Steve.  “You ok?”

 

“Sure,” Steve says.  But Bucky’s brow furrows.

 

Tony approaches, his Ironman suit making his footsteps echo metallically on the concrete under foot.  “That thing’s lit up in FRIDAY’s scans,” he says, gesturing at the building.  “Like, neon. Definitely some HYDRA action.”

 

Clint, Sam, and Nat join the small assembly, adjusting goggles and gun belts.  Steve drops his hand from Bucky’s arm and assumes a more captain-like stance.

 

“You gonna say something, Cap?” Clint asks expectantly.  “Like, rev us up or something?”

 

“Uh,” Steve says.  He knows what he’s supposed to say.  Storm the castle and knock down HYDRA and blah, blah, blah. 

 

“We already know,” Tony says, starting to hover and slipping his red and gold arm around Nat’s waist.  “Take down agents.  Get intel.  Rescue hostages.”  He rises higher than the barrier, then dips out of sight as he flies down to the sidewalk with Nat. 

 

Sam follows immediately with Clint, and Steve turns to Bucky.  “Ready?” he asks.

 

“Uh-huh,” Bucky answers, throwing one leg over the barrier. 

 

He and Steve parkour their way down five or so vertical levels and bound across the street to where Tony is already letting a repulsor beam loose on a padlock chained to what appears to be a side door.  The thing sizzles and the rusty chain falls to the ground with an almost melodic clunk. 

 

Tony blasts the door open as well, like he couldn’t be bothered to reach out and push.  It’s fair behavior coming from him.  Always brash, impatient, and reckless.  He’s not bothered by the blatant weirdness of the whole thing. 

 

Neither are Clint and Sam, apparently, for they follow Tony through the open door at a sprint to match his hover.  They’re both game, flexible, and borderline overconfident.  Why be wary when you can just be prepared?

 

Steve glances at Bucky, and matches his stride over the scorched remnants of door and into the dark hallway.  Bucky hasn’t been on a mission before, so he doesn’t have a clear idea of what’s normal and what’s not, but he does know HYDRA better than any of them.  When he’d looked at the holographic maps in the kitchen this morning and emotionlessly confirmed the electronic fingerprint emanating from the building as HYDRA, Steve had believed him.  And now, as they creep cautiously over dusty linoleum, he still believes him. 

 

Nat is practically back-to-back with Steve, creeping up the hall with her gun drawn like an FBI agent in some primetime TV show.  Steve adjusts the com in his ear to make sure it’s on, then asks Bucky, “Any particular area they’d be in?”

 

“Basement, if there is one,” Bucky answers.  “They have kind of a thing for underground places.”

 

“I’m pulling up architectural plans,” Tony says.  Steve watches the Ironman suit round a corner ahead and zip out of sight.  “Willow Oaks Hospital,” he informs a moment later.  “Closed for good in ’08 with the recession, but was in bad shape long before that.  And yes, it does have a basement.  Which was previously a morgue.  So, gross.”

 

“That’s where they’ll be,” Bucky says.  He pulls his gun from his holster.  “Are there stairs marked on your plans?”

 

“No need for that,” Tony says.  There’s the crackle of the repulsor again, and the sound of falling rubble.

 

“Did you just blow a hole in the floor?” Steve asks.

 

“Yep.”

 

“Really, Tony?”

 

“Come on, it’s a condemned building.  I’m helping move along the demolition process.”

 

Tony’s already lowering through the crater, and Sam is hovering, ready to follow.  Steve crouches at the edge of the hole and peers cautiously over the edge, holding his shield protectively in front of him.  It’s eerily silent.  He’d expected to hear shouting, scrambling, and return fire at the least. 

 

“Anything?” Steve asks Tony.

 

“Ummm…” Tony stalls.  “15 or so dead bodies.  Might be more under the rubble.”

 

“Are you seriously making a morgue joke?” Sam asks, flaring his wings open and swooping through the hole. 

 

Steve gives him a second, then asks, “Sam?”

 

“No joke,” Sam replies.  “There were agents, but they’re dead now.”

 

Steve cautiously lowers his shield and leans over the edge of the jagged opening in the floor.  He can’t see the whole room, but there are several bodies dressed in black and green fatigues strewn on the floor.  Computers and workstations are still lit up.  It’s as if something swept through and toppled them with no notice.

 

“Can you tell how they were killed?” Bucky asks, also leaning over the edge of the hole.

 

“Mmmm,” Sam says.  “Looks like some of them have blood around the face.  Like the eyes and nose.  But no bodily injury I can see.”

 

“Huh,” Bucky says.

 

“Remind you of anything?”  Steve asks, glancing at Bucky, who is still gazing through the floor and biting his lip.

 

“I…don’t know,” He finally answers.

 

“Nat, you’ll want to get down here and look at these systems,” Tony says.  “Everything’s still up and running; you’ll probably get a great digital fingerprint.”  He zooms around the basement and pauses right under the crater.  “I’ll catch you if you wanna jump.”

 

Nat rolls her eyes and jumps, elegantly elbowing Tony in the faceplate as he lowers her to the floor.  She picks her way around chunks of busted up ceiling tile and nudges a body-laden swivel chair a few feet out of the way so she can hunch over the glowing monitor. 

 

“I’m thinking these dudes have been gone a while, probably overnight,” Sam says.  “Or at least since early this morning.”  He’s crouching beside the body of a man with dark hair.  He uses tentative fingers to shift the agent onto his back.  “I’m getting livor and rigor…” Sam gestures at the reddish-purple discoloration of the face and the clenched position of the hand.

 

“What about cause of death?” Steve calls down.

 

“With bleeding like that, it’s like an aneurism or electrocution or something.  Or a weapon that emulates it, since it seems like everyone went down the same way.”

 

“Ok, I’m gonna start a sweep,” Clint says, standing from his crouched position at the edge of the crater.  He looks mildly disgusted.  “Anybody want to come?”

 

“Yeah, that’s a better idea than all of us just standing here,” Steve says.  He straightens up, and Bucky follows suit.  He has a slightly glazed look, and Steve eyes him warily. 

 

“You got any heat signatures?” Clint calls down to Tony.  “Anything we should be looking for?”

 

“Hold on a sec…” Tony says.  “It’s weird ‘cause my vantage point is down here, but moving won’t help since I don’t have surveillance…There might be something, somewhere, upstairs.  Could be more computer equipment, though, so…” he trails off.

 

“Right,” Steve says.  “Let’s alternate floors,” he tells Clint.  “You want to take this one, and Buck and I’ll go up one?”

 

“Sure,” Clint says, taking an arrow from his quiver and preparing his bow.

 

When the archer has disappeared down the hall, Steve hefts his shield and he and Bucky start up the narrow stairwell beside a bank of elevators that don’t appear to be powered. 

 

“You’ve done this before in training, it’s just weird in a building,” Steve reminds Bucky, who seems lost in thought.  “It’s easier to run all over the place and look for survivors when we’re outside.”

 

“I know,” Bucky replies in a monotone. 

 

They emerge onto the second floor.  It looks like a regular hospital ward with a deserted nurse’s station up front and a hall of light wood doors stretching beyond.  Steve pauses at the curved counter of the nurse’s station where a computer is flickering oddly, as if the power cord is only partially plugged in.  “I wonder if this was the heat signature…” he says. 

Steve looks to Bucky, but he’s no longer at his side.  “Buck?”

 

Bucky’s meandering down the hall.  “Buck,” Steve says again, this time not as a question.

 

Bucky stops in front of the fifth door on the left side of the hall.

 

“It’s easier to start with the first one so you know where you’ve—”

 

“This one,” Bucky says quietly.

 

“What?”

 

“It’s this one.”

 

“Why?  Do you remember something?”  Steve asks.

 

“I think…I’ve been here before.”

 

***

 

Bucky grasps the doorknob and turns it.  It’s unlocked.  The heavy door swings open.  Steve raises his shield in front of his body and steps across the threshold. 

 

It looks like a basic hospital room.  The blinds on the window are closed, and the space is dimly lit.  The walls appear to be light pink, as is the plasticky laminate chair pushed up against one wall. There’s a table on rollers, and it’s littered with papers and pens and soda cans. 

 

The bed is neatly made with soft pink blankets, and resting up against the pillows with legs drawn to chest is a girl.

 

Long blonde hair hangs limply around her face and shoulders like a curtain, and her forehead rests on her arms, which are folded across the knees of her jeans. 

 

“Hey,” Steve says, weighing the odds that she’s either an agent or a hostage.

 

The girl lifts her head so her forehead and eyebrows are visible, but the rest of her face is still shadowed.  Steve sees the wet-looking glint of her eyes, like a scared animal burrowed in darkness.

 

“We’re going to help you,” Steve says, deciding on hostage.  “Can you raise your hands?  Let us know it’s ok?”

 

The com in Steve’s ear buzzes slightly and Nat’s voice says, “There might be a prisoner or something.  These files are jacked, whatever killed the agents fried the system.  But there’s a ton of stuff about—”  The com abruptly cuts out.

 

“Steve,” Bucky says, a note of warning in his voice.

 

The girl doesn’t move.  Were Steve’s questions too complicated?

 

“HYDRA’s not in charge anymore,” Steve says.  Maybe that was too simple.  Will she get angry if she feels patronized?  He wonders how old she is.  Anything from 12 to 30 seems plausible.  A new thought comes up, and he wonders if she understands English.

 

“Can you sit up?”  Steve takes a tentative step forward, lowering his shield slightly and reaching up to remove his helmet.  “My name’s Steve.  We’re going to help you.”

 

“Steve,” Bucky says again.  “Be careful.”

 

“Yeah,” Steve says.  “Do you…remember her?”  He flips up the front part and makes his face visible, all the while maintaining eye contact with the girl. 

 

“She’s…” Bucky says.

 

Steve breaks eye contact to glance at Bucky.  “An agent?” he asks.

 

“An asset,” Bucky breathes.

 

“What?” Steve says, taken aback.

 

“I tested her,” Bucky says quietly.

 

The girl slowly lifts her head and shifts her gaze to Bucky.  Her eyes are a deep green and somewhat wild looking, and her lips are parted and trembling.

 

“This is James.  He’s here to help you,” Steve says.  “You’re free now.”  He extends a hand hesitantly toward her.

 

She doesn’t respond.  The girl blinks and resumes her gaze on Bucky’s face.  “Soldier,” she breathes.

 

There’s a beat of silence.  “Yeah,” Bucky murmurs back.

 

Steve’s flooded with doubt as to what to do next.  He’s lost all faith that the girl is friendly, and he’s starting to lose faith that Bucky is completely in control.

 

“Buck?” Steve asks.  “You ok?”

 

“Yeah, I’m good.” Bucky breathes.  “But watch—”

 

Something hits Steve in the face like a freezing, wet baseball that passes through his sinuses and explodes in excruciating lightning bolts behind his eyes.  He drops his shield and throws his arm over his head, groaning in pain.  He’d had a steady headache earlier, but this is different.  This is agony.

 

“Hey, stop!” He hears Bucky yelling.  

 

There’s pressure on Steve’s arm and shoulder and indistinct shouting beside his ear.  The sound hurts and sends bright vibrations across his vision. 

 

Perspective shifts.  Steve’s eye-to-eye with someone, there’s a forehead wrinkled in pain.  A hand comes up to rip the Captain America helmet from a head of short, messy blonde hair.  Lips purse around a sharp inhalation and a grunt that Steve feels reverberate in his lungs.

 

It shifts again.  He’s looking straight down at Bucky, who is letting go of the blonde man’s shoulder and rushing a small figure balanced on her knees at the foot of the bed.  He tackles her and smashes her head into the mattress.  “Stop!  Fucking stop it!” he’s shouting.

 

Steve feels something wet trickling down his face to his upper lip.  It’s like an ice pick is jamming into his eye socket.  The blonde man crumpled against the wall drags his sleeve under his bleeding nose and squeezes his eyes shut.

 

Bucky has the girl by the shoulders.  She struggles, catching him under the jaw with her fist.  His neck snaps back, but he shakes it off and shoves her into the rail on the side of the bed.  Her head cracks against the plastic and she goes limp in Bucky’s hands.

 

Steve is melting, dripping down from the ceiling and into a puddle on the floor.  The wall materializes behind his back to support him, and the throbbing ache in his head redoubles as his vision shifts nauseatingly to forward-facing. 

 

There’s loud crackling in his ear.  “Fuck,” Steve slurs.

 

“What?” his ear says loudly.  “Since when do you cuss like that?”

 

“Do you need backup?”

 

“Yes,” Bucky says.  “Backup.”  He’s suddenly back at Steve’s side.

 

Steve blinks hard and tries to get a grip on his surroundings.  Bucky’s squatting on the floor next to Steve’s shoulder, supporting him back against the wall.  The girl is crumpled across the narrow bed, completely unmoving.

 

Mission, Steve thinks.  HYDRA.  Then…pain.  He smells blood.  Steve lifts his hand to wipe beneath his nose.  His hand’s already smeared with dark red.  He snuffs in a sharp inhale and dabs, feeling slightly congealed fluid.

 

The door bangs against the wall and Tony, Clint, and Nat burst into the room.  Steve winces and squeezes his eyes shut. 

 

“What happened?” Tony demands, far too loudly.

 

“Sshh, wait, stop,” Bucky says.

 

“Is she a hostage?”  Clint asks.  Then, “What happened to you?”  He’s staring at Steve.

 

“I don’t…” Steve starts.  He presses hard between his eyes to stave off the dizziness.  “I think it was her.”

 

“What, that little—”  He gestures at the girl’s still form.  Bucky draws his hand across his throat, telling Clint to shut up.

 

“Do you need help?  Can you get up?” Tony asks in an intense whisper.  He clunks to his knees on Steve’s other side.

 

“I’m good,” Steve groans.  “Just…headache.”  He starts to shove himself off the floor with one hand and gets to a stooped position before vertigo intensifies the throbbing behind his forehead. “And dizzy.  Jesus.”

 

“No, don’t stand up yet,” Bucky says, guiding Steve back down.

 

Nat’s reaching for the girl’s neck with one hand, her gun held steadily in the other.

 

“We have to take her back to the tower,” Bucky whispers.

 

“Not a hospital?  Like, a real hospital?”  Tony asks.  “She’s civilian?  Hostage?”

 

“Asset,” Bucky murmurs.

 

“What?  Fuck, no,” Tony responds, hovering off the ground. 

 

“Calm down,” Nat says, suddenly the one in control as she feels for the girl’s pulse.  “Don’t worry about taking her anywhere.  She’s gone.”  She gently releases her touch, holsters her gun, and turns back to Bucky.  “I know you didn’t mean to…”

 

“No…” Bucky murmurs.  “No, we…have to help…”

 

“Don’t worry about it,” Steve attempts to soothe, fighting a wave of nausea.  “You have to neutralize an adversary when they attack.  You did good…” 

 

“Yeah, you did the right thing.  She was trying to kill Cap, wasn’t’ she?”  Tony’s squinting at the blood under Steve’s nose.

 

“But…She probably wasn’t loyal to HYDRA.  I think it was her that killed all the agents.  Was…probably trying to escape or something.  We could’ve helped…”  Bucky’s bordering on upset now, and Steve recognizes that he’s not in a good position to calm him down.  He does the best thing he can think of in his state of fogginess and bows forward to rest his head on Bucky’s shoulder and wrap his arms around his neck.

 

“You did ok,” Steve murmurs. 

 

“I got a look at the files in the computer systems,” Nat says.  “I couldn’t get a lot out of them, but I think I got the gist.  Her name is Andrea.  And before she was taken, she was a 16-year-old girl,” Nat fills in.  “But she’s been held here for years, she was brainwashed, using her mind as a weapon, really dangerous…”

 

“But god, we should have helped her…” Bucky groans into Steve’s hair.  “It’s like… She deserved…” 

 

Steve knows what he’s thinking.  Bucky was an asset, and now he’s more or less himself again.  But…there’s no guarantee rehabilitation works for every case.  And it takes a lot more than just a man with a plan, as Steve’s learned the hard way.

 

The more Steve thinks, the more his head throbs, and a surge of sweltering pins and needles sweeps from his limbs into his core.  His face feels numb against Bucky’s shoulder.

 

Finally someone speaks.  “If…this is it, we should probably go.”  Clint opens the door with a loud click against the silent room.

 

“Yeah, that’s all the heat signatures.  There’s nothing else for us here,” Tony says, getting to his feet.  He pauses.  “You guys ok?  Can you…get up by yourselves?”

 

Steve imagines he and Bucky look out of place, embracing and still smashed against the wall.  “Yeah, I think we’re good,” he says, though he has to swallow hard to force the words out.  He pats Bucky on the back and uses all the strength in his trembling legs to start shoving himself to his feet.

 

Bucky loops his arm around Steve’s waist for support, and they don’t get far out of the room before Steve’s grateful for it.  The nausea he’d been swallowing rushes up almost as soon as he starts walking, and he has to stop, swaying slightly, and clench his teeth to keep from throwing up or passing out.

 

“You don’t look so good,” Bucky says.

 

“I’m ok,” Steve forces out.  His head aches fiercely, but he’s pretty sure there’s nothing physically wrong, or at least nothing that won’t pass after a few hours.  He’s more concerned about Bucky.

 

***

 

Once on the jet, Steve commandeers two seats so he can partially recline with his head against the cool pane of the window.  Bucky settles in the rear-facing seat across from him.  “I know you’re hurting,” he says.

 

“It’s a headache.  I’m fine,” Steve insists.

 

“It’s way more than that,” Bucky says.  “You had a headache this morning.  Now you look like you’re gonna be sick.”

 

Bucky’s probably right, Steve does feel the urge to vomit sitting in his throat.  But he’s trying his best to suppress it.  For Bucky’s sake.  “I’m ok,” he breathes.  “I’m…I know that didn’t go well for you.”

 

“I, yeah.  I don’t know,” Bucky murmurs.  “I didn’t…  But she was just…hurting you so bad.”  Emotion trembles in his rough voice.

 

Steve wants to wrap Bucky into another hug, but as soon as he sits up, his body has other ideas.  The first gag doesn’t bring up anything, but the second sends a rush of fluid into the plastic bag that Bucky’s somehow managed to shake open under his face.  

 

“Oh, god, I’m sorry,” Steve croaks.  “I’m ok, really.”  He heaves again.

 

“No, you’re not,” Bucky says firmly.

 

Steve’s silenced for a minute as his system continues its exodus.  Then he concedes, “Yeah.  Ok.  But you’re not either.”

 

***

 

When Steve’s pale and sweaty, but mercifully empty, he and Bucky are back sitting face to face, leaning in slightly toward each other.  Clouds flash past the jet’s window, but Steve has no desire to look down at the scenery.  He still feels out of his depth, but with Bucky’s well-being circling back to his main priority, Steve thinks he might be finding it again.

 

“You don’t have to talk about it,” Steve whispers.  “But, if you want to.  You knew her.  You said you tested her.”

 

“I, uh, yeah,” Bucky sighs.  “I don’t know the whole thing, but I remember, it was right after they got her.  Like she was a new doll to play with.”  He takes a deep breath.  “And they just said ‘kill her,’ and I guess the told her ‘kill him.’  It was hand-to-hand, no weapons, so I guess we just went for it, and I don’t really remember past that.” 

 

“Hm,” Steve says.

 

Bucky reaches into the seat beside him to retrieve a water bottle.  He takes a sip and offers it to Steve, who weakly shakes his head.  Bucky says, “It was weird, though.  Like I…wasn’t in my body.”

 

“Yeah, I, uh,” Steve starts, clearing a layer of mucous from his throat, “That’s what I felt too.”

 

The flimsy plastic of the water bottle crunches under Bucky’s hands.  “I’m not sure I’m ready for this.  For…being in the field.  Even though I’m on the right side of things again.”

 

“You don’t have to be,” Steve says.  “You did just fine today, but it doesn’t have to be for you.”

 

“I’ll try again,” Bucky promises.  “I, just, I’ve had enough.  For right now.  For today.”

 

Steve palms his own sore forehead with one hand and reaches for Bucky with the other.  “Yeah.  Me too.”

**Author's Note:**

> Let me know if there are any other angsty sick scenarios you'd like to see...


End file.
